The present invention relates to segmented retaining wall systems for soil retention or other environmental or aesthetic uses. In particular, the invention relates to retaining wall systems using masonry blocks to create modules resulting in a random appearance of the face of a retaining wall.
Segmented retaining wall systems are commonly used for residential, commercial and governmental projects. Transportation departments and the U.S. Army Corps of engineers routinely use retaining wall systems to retain soil and other structures. These systems can create straight or curved walls and can even be used along shore lines where embankment control is desired.
Segmented retaining wall systems can be comprised of poured slabs, bricks, natural stone, masonry blocks or other components. Individual units can be held together by mortar, other adhesives, gravity, pins, or other fasteners.
Uniform bricks or masonry blocks can provide a stable, durable and attractive retaining wall. However, these walls tend to have a very homogenous and uniform appearance that may not be suitable for every project. Sometimes a more unique randomized retaining wall or landscape is desired.
Natural stone can be used to provide a unique random appearance to a landscape. However, without the use of mortar or some other adhesive/sealant, natural stone retaining walls have poor soil retention properties. Additionally, Natural Stone retaining walls are expensive and cumbersome to construct. It is therefore desired to create a retaining wall system that maintains the unique random quality of a natural stone wall surface, with the structural and soil retention properties, as well as the economic efficiencies, of man-made masonry block walls.
Working with masonry blocks of different size affects the securing methods typically used during construction. A mortarless wall that uses pins to secure masonry blocks would require numerous pins of different sizes corresponding to the size of the particular masonry block. Installers have the burden of keeping track of the appropriate pins and using them accordingly. It is desirable to have a universal securing pin that could be used with different sized masonry blocks.
Depending on the requirements of the landscape, the composition of the soil, the height of a wall, or the desired aesthetic appearance of a wall, a segmented retaining wall may need to be canted or vertical. It is desirable to have masonry blocks for a mortarless segmented retaining wall that can be used to build either a canted wall or a vertical wall.